Never the Selves Shall Meet
by Proper Prose
Summary: It was like looking in a mirror that showed what could have been.


My Hero Academia

Never the Selves Shall Meet

It was odd, Midoriya had decided. So similar, yet also very different. It was like looking at a fun house mirror.

Sadly, the whole experience had been far from 'fun'. Being attacked and then kidnapped usually tended to ruin a person's day.

A pane of glass separated the two of them, Midoriya Suzuki and Akatani Mikumo, not unlike a mirror. The only differences any would see at first glance would be their hair, Mikumo's locks were black after the dye had been washed out and somehow even messier than Midoriya's.

But reflections in the mirror would not move unless he did.

Or speak.

"Oh, it's you. The other me." Mikumo said in his flat tone. It was already off putting, but it crossed into the realm of eerie when someone heard their voice from out of someone else's mouth.

Mikumo had also looked like he had been through hell and back. Bandages covered the bruises on his left cheek, arms, chest and the multiple lacerations he had suffered when being subdued. Class 1-A had not been kind to him when his deception was revealed.

In return he had fought like a demon. Brutal, fast and trying to give every hit he took back twice over. Some of the others feared Mikumo went feral from battle rage.

His costume, what was left of it, was similarly different to Midoriya as the rest of him was. Midoriya noted that it most resembled his first costume just in red instead of green. However, the mask was different. The eyeholes angled to be sharper, less round. Cartoonish fangs in place of a goofy smile.

It screamed the wearer was angry and dangerous.

It was more armed too. Spiked elbow guards and a belt with a variety of tools and weapons. Plenty of smoke bombs. All confiscated, naturally.

Midoriya wondered if Mikumo was more aggressive than him. Or did he not trust his control over his quirk? He still did not have full control over it after all.

His name was Akatani Mikumo. He claimed to be a version of Midoriya from another word world and masqueraded as him. His claims were unverified. He was dangerous. He was an enigma.

Midoriya had so many questions. Aizawa had given them ten minutes alone before the authorities would come to take his doppelganger into custody...

It was time for answers.

"Why did you pretend to be me?"

Mikumo's face twitched, the only hint that he might have had the urge to smile. "Need a mirror? If not you could just stare at me some more."

Sarcasm. Mikumo sounded defensive. Or cocky. "So you're really me from another world?"

"Maybe. I could be lying out my ass."

Crass in a way he was not, but like Kacchan. Mikumo had an excellent poker face, to be sure. But at least Midoriya could infer that he found their resemblance amusing in some way. Aside from that single twitch his face was as blank as ever and he never raised or inflected his voice.

That was what had gotten him caught in the end. That was how his classmates discovered that he had been replaced. Mikumo's acting started strong enough, but was too forced. It had only lasted a few hours, a whole day at most, but according to the others the facade had been breaking long before the confrontation. He had become dismissive when Midoriya would have been friendly. Brutally critical instead of tactfully constructive. And, above all, angry. He had been angry at everyone around him. Mikumo had an undercurrent of volatile emotion that came to a head during the battle.

Mikumo could not get along with other people, Midoriya realized. Not with Class 1-A, at least.

"Why?"

A shift of the eyebrows, confused, Mikumo answered. "Why what?"

"Why did you pretend to be me?" Midoriya asked once more. There were a thousand questions rattling in his brain. Why is your name different? Why is your hair black? Why did you not use your Quirk? How did you get here? But there was only one that mattered at the moment.

For a time Mikumo was silent and Midoriya was worried. There was no clock in the room. It had not been long but how much of their ten minutes was left?

"Because…"

Their eyes met and suddenly the mask for an instant- just for an instant- it broke. Midoriya saw many things he had seen in his own eyes when he looked in the mirror before meeting All Might. He saw anger, pain, loneliness, rejection and…

A tear. A single tear slid down Mikumo's blank face.

"Because, in another life, this life… I could have been you."

Mikumo's body shuddered. He began shaking, hands clenched into fists. Arms dug into his sides as he tried to regain control. Much like when had been confronted, something was trying to break out of him. It had reminded him of Kacchan, frankly, much like Mikumo's other qualities had.

The shaking passed soon. He had seemed to have bottled up again but his face was different now. His face set in a frown and glaring at Midoriya, Mikumo looked… slightly affronted some reason. As if what he saw before him was an object of disgust.

"And for that, I hate you."

The words did not shock Midoriya. He had figured that much out on his own. That Mikumo hated him. He had walked a mile in Midoriya's shoes, literally, and something about his life had set Mikumo off.

Assuming that there was a Quirk capable of allowing travel between alternate worlds, could Mikumo truly have been an alternate version of himself? If so, was his life truly so different from his own? Did his life make Mikumo envious to the point of anger?

What was it that made them so different?

Mikumo turned away. "I had my fun. Now leave. Go back to your friends-" His face twisted in an angry (hurt) scowl. "-and enjoy your life."

Midoriya realized that at some point he had stopped watching the clock and door. As though summoned by Mikumo's words, though he had not been called, the guard entered room.

"Are you finished in here?" He asked. "The police are here for the transfer."

Midoriya allowed himself to be guided out of the room without a word. As he mulled over what Mikumo had said, he heard him speak one last time. Whether Mikumo knew he could hear him Midoriya did not know. The other boy was speaking quiet enough he had almost missed it, but each anguished word sounded like his facade breaking like glass.

"I wish I had your life…"


End file.
